scholarly journals Not Wanted: On Scharp’s Solution to the Liar

Erkenntnis ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Pinder
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language ◽  
Alternative Treatment ◽  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Adequate Account ◽  
Liar Sentence ◽  
Truth Conditional ◽  
Concept Of Truth ◽  
Resultant Theory ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox

AbstractKevin Scharp argues that the concept of truth is defective, and is therefore unable to play its intended role in natural language truth-conditional semantics. As such, for this theoretical purpose, Scharp constructs two replacements: ascending truth and descending truth. Scharp applies the resultant theory, AD semantics, to the liar sentence, thereby obtaining a novel solution to the liar paradox. The aim of the present paper is fourfold. First, I show that, contrary to Scharp’s claims, AD semantics in fact yields an inconsistency when applied to standard liar sentences. Second, I diagnose the problem: AD semantics mishandles negation. I propose an alternative treatment, resulting in what I call AD* semantics. Third, I show that AD* semantics gives Scharp the resources required to respond to an alleged revenge paradox that has been raised against his view. Finally, I argue that, these consequences notwithstanding, it remains unclear whether AD* semantics provides an adequate account of alethic paradoxes more generally.

Pluralism and the Liar

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cory Wright ◽  
Bradley Armour-Garb
Keyword(s):  
Alternative Treatment ◽  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Recent Attempt ◽  
In Virtue Of ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox

Pluralists maintain that there is more than one truth property in virtue of which bearers are true. Unfortunately, it is not yet clear how they diagnose the liar paradox or what resources they have available to treat it. This chapter considers one recent attempt by Cotnoir (2013b) to treat the Liar. It argues that pluralists should reject the version of pluralism that Cotnoir assumes, discourse pluralism, in favor of a more naturalized approach to truth predication in real languages, which should be a desideratum on any successful pluralist conception. Appealing to determination pluralism instead, which focuses on truth properties, it then proposes an alternative treatment to the Liar that shows liar sentences to be undecidable.

scholarly journals The Liar Without Relativism

Erkenntnis ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Poppy Mankowitz
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Full Understanding ◽  
Truth Values ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox ◽  
Semantic Relativism

AbstractSome in the recent literature have claimed that a connection exists between the Liar paradox and semantic relativism: the view that the truth values of certain occurrences of sentences depend on the contexts at which they are assessed. Sagi (Erkenntnis 82(4):913–928, 2017) argues that contextualist accounts of the Liar paradox are committed to relativism, and Rudnicki and Łukowski (Synthese 1–20, 2019) propose a new account that they classify as relativist. I argue that a full understanding of how relativism is conceived within theories of natural language shows that neither of the purported connections can be maintained. There is no reason why a solution to the Liar paradox needs to accept relativism.

The Liar Parody

Philosophy ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 63 (243) ◽  
pp. 43-62
Author(s):  
Don S. Levi
Keyword(s):  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Liar Sentence ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox

The Liar Paradox is a philosophical bogyman. It refuses to die, despite everything that philosophers have done to kill it. Sometimes the attacks on it seem little more than expressions of positivist petulance, as when the Liar sentence is said to be nonsense or meaningless. Sometimes the attacks are based on administering to the Liar sentence arbitrary if not unfair tests for admitting of truth or falsity that seem designed expressly to keep it from qualifying. Some philosophers have despaired of ever beating the Liar; so concerned have they been about the threat posed by the Liar that they have introduced legislation to exclude the Liar sentence and anything like it.

Revenge, I

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keith Simmons
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language ◽  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Critical Discussion ◽  
Kripke’S Theory Of Truth ◽  
Law Of Excluded Middle ◽  
Truth Value ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox ◽  
Excluded Middle

Chapter 8 is the first of two chapters on the phenomenon of revenge paradoxes, paradoxes which, roughly speaking, are constructed out of the very terms of a purported solution. The chapter begins by exploring the difficulties that revenge presents for Kripke’s theory of truth, in either of two versions: a version that admits truth value gaps, and a paracomplete version which rejects the law of excluded middle. The chapter goes on to critically examine Field’s paracomplete theory of truth and its treatment of revenge, arguing that Field’s theory is couched in terms that are artificial and too far removed from natural language. The chapter concludes with a critical discussion of Priest’s dialetheist approach to the Liar paradox, according to which there are true contradictions. It is argued that Priest’s theory is itself subject to revenge paradoxes.

Thinking about the Liar, Fast and Slow

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Barnard ◽  
Joseph Ulatowski ◽  
Jonathan M. Weinberg ◽  
Bradley Armour-Garb
Keyword(s):  
Moral Responsibility ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Liar Paradox ◽  
The Past ◽  
Liar Sentence ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox

In the past, experimental philosophers have explored the psychological underpinning of a number of notions in philosophy, including free will, moral responsibility, and more. But prior to this chapter, although a number of philosophers have speculated on how ordinary folks might, or should, think about the liar paradox, no one had systematically explored the psychological underpinnings of the Liar itself. The authors take on this task. In particular, the chapter investigates the status of a liar sentence, L = ‘Sentence L is false’. The thesis, arrived at by interpreting the data the authors have accrued, is that reflective thinkers (some of whom possess a modicum of philosophical expertise) judge L to be neither true nor false (as opposed to false or true), and the authors see this as some evidence for the claim that L is neither true nor false.

The liar paradox in the predictive mind

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (2-3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Unknown / not yet matched
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Conceptual Knowledge ◽  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Predictive Processing ◽  
World Knowledge ◽  
Psychological Issues ◽  
Liar Sentence ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox ◽  
Conceptual Competence

Abstract Most discussions frame the Liar Paradox as a formal logical-linguistic puzzle. Attempts to resolve the paradox have focused very little so far on aspects of cognitive psychology and processing, because semantic and cognitive-psychological issues are generally assumed to be disjunct. I provide a motivation and carry out a cognitive-computational treatment of the liar paradox based on a cognitive-computational model of language and conceptual knowledge within the Predictive Processing (PP) framework. I suggest that the paradox arises as a failure of synchronization between two ways of generating the liar situation in two different (idealized) PP sub-models, one corresponding to language processing and the other to the processing of meaning and world-knowledge. In this way, I put forward the claim that the liar sentence is meaningless but has an air of meaningfulness. I address the possible objection that the proposal violates the Principle of Unrestricted Compositionality, which purportedly regulates the conceptual competence of thinkers.

The Early Arabic Liar: The Liar Paradox in the Islamic World from the Mid-Ninth to the Mid-Thirteenth Centuries CE

Vivarium ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ahmed Alwishah ◽  
David Sanson
Keyword(s):  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Truth Condition ◽  
Correspondence Theory ◽  
Islamic World ◽  
Liar Sentence ◽  
Correspondence Theory Of Truth ◽  
The Liar ◽  
Plural Subjects ◽  
The Liar Paradox

AbstractWe describe the earliest occurrences of the Liar Paradox in the Arabic tradition. The early Mutakallimūn claim the Liar Sentence is both true and false; they also associate the Liar with problems concerning plural subjects, which is somewhat puzzling. Abharī (1200-1265) ascribes an unsatisfiable truth condition to the Liar Sentence—as he puts it, its being true is the conjunction of its being true and false—and so concludes that the sentence is not true. Tūsī (1201-1274) argues that self-referential sen-tences, like the Liar, are not truth-apt, and defends this claim by appealing to a correspondence theory of truth. Translations of the texts are provided as an appendix.

Unsettled Problems with Vague Truth

1995 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-117
Author(s):  
Andrew P. Mills
Keyword(s):  
Liar Paradox ◽  
Borderline Case ◽  
List Type ◽  
Type Number ◽  
Natural Reaction ◽  
Liar Sentence ◽  
Truth Value ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox

A tempting solution to problems of semantic vagueness and to the Liar Paradox is an appeal to truth-value gaps. It is tempting to say, for example, that, where Harry is a borderline case of bald, the sentence(1)Harry is baldis neither true nor false: it is in the ‘gap’ between these two values, and perhaps deserves a third truth-value. Similarly with the Liar Paradox. Consider the following Liar sentence:(2)(2) is false.That is, sentence (2) says of itself that it is false. If we accept the Tarskian schema(T) S is true iff pwhere ‘S’ is a name of a sentence ‘p,’ we are led into paradox. Both the assumption that (2) is true, and the assumption that (2) is false lead us, via (T), to(3)(2) is true if and only if (2) is false.Given this result, a natural reaction is to place (2) in a ‘gap’ between true and false.

Tarski on the Concept of Truth

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Greg Ray
Keyword(s):  
Liar Paradox ◽  
What Is Said ◽  
Truth Definition ◽  
Concept Of Truth ◽  
First Time ◽  
The Liar ◽  
The Liar Paradox

Alfred Tarski’s work on truth has been so central to the discourse on truth that most coming to it for the first time have probably already heard a great deal about what is said there. Unfortunately, since the work is largely technical and Tarski was only tangentially philosophical, a certain incautious assimilation dominates many philosophical discussions of Tarski’s ideas, and so, examining Tarski on the concept of truth is in many ways an act of unlearning. This chapter will focus on key ideas in Tarski’s work that have had a lasting impact: T-sentence, Convention T, Tarskian truth definition, and Tarski’s general limiting theses on the expressibility and definability of truth. Though these ideas are familiar in name, the chapter seeks to uncover and remove certain widespread misunderstandings. Tarski’s name also features prominently in discussions of the liar paradox, so we will discuss Tarski’s misunderstood connection to this ancient puzzle.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document